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Herbert Lom was born on September 11, 1917 as Herbert Charles Angelo Kuchacevich ze Schluderpacheru into an aristocratic family living in genteel poverty. His incredibly long surnames led him to select the shortest surname he could find extant ("Lom") and adopt it as his own, professionally. He made his film debut in the Czech film Woman Below the Cross (1937) and played supporting and, occasionally, lead roles. His career picked up in the 1940s and he played, among other roles, Napoleon Bonaparte in The Young Mr. Pitt (1942) and in War and Peace (1956). In a rare starring role, Lom played twin trapeze artists in Dual Alibi (1947). He continued into the 1950s with roles opposite Alec Guinness and Peter Sellers in The Ladykillers (1955), and Robert Mitchum, Jack Lemmon and Rita Hayworth in Fire Down Below (1957). His career really took off in the 1960s and he got the title role in Hammer Films' production of The Phantom of the Opera (1962). He also played "Captain Nemo" in Mysterious Island (1961) and landed supporting parts in El Cid (1961) and an especially showy role in Spartacus (1960) as a pirate chieftain contracted to transport Spartacus' army away from Italy.

The 1960s was also the decade in which Lom secured the role for which he will always be remembered: Clouseau/Peter Sellers' long-suffering boss, Commissioner Charles Dreyfus, in the "Pink Panther" films, in which he pulled off the not-inconsiderable feat of stealing almost every scene he and Sellers were in--a real accomplishment, considering what a veteran scene-stealer Sellers was. However, Lom did not concentrate solely on feature films. He became a familiar face to British television viewers when he starred as Dr. Roger Corder in The Human Jungle (1963). He moved into horror films in the 1970s, with parts in Asylum (1972) and And Now the Screaming Starts! (1973). He played Prof. Abraham Van Helsing opposite Christopher Lee in Count Dracula (1970), matching wits against the sinister vampire himself.

Lom appeared as one of the victims in Ten Little Indians (1974), the drunken Dr. Edward Armstrong. His career continued into the 1980s, a standout role being that of Christopher Walken's sympathetic doctor in The Dead Zone (1983). He also played opposite Walter Matthau in Hopscotch (1980) and returned to the murder mystery Ten Little Indians (1989), this time playing The General. Lom has been taking it easy since then, though he returned to his familiar role of Dreyfus in Son of the Pink Panther (1993). He was always a reliable and eminently watchable actor, and unfortunately did not receive the stardom he should have.

Herbert Lom died in his sleep at age 95 on September 27, 2012, in London, England.

Vladimir Kulich is known for his work in The Equalizer, Vikings, 13th Warrior, Smoking' Aces, Ironclad,The X Files, and as the voice of Ulfric Stormcloak in one of the most successful video games of all time, Skyrim-The Elder Scrolls. He has given memorable performances opposite academy award winners and nominees including Denzel Washington, Christopher Plummer, Max Von Sydow, Paul Giamatti, John Savage and Antonio Banderas. Vladimir was born in Prague and began his training at the State Theatre of Czechoslovakia. Today he lives in a little cabin, surrounded by 'Silicon Beach' mansions, in Venice, California.

Prague born, Vancouver raised, David Nykl arrived in Canada at age two when his family emigrated from Czechoslovakia after the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact invasion of what was then Czechoslovakia.

David started early as an actor in Vancouver: community theater, small TV parts, and classes in dance and music. He graduated University of British Columbia with an Major in English Literature and Theater.

Post graduation David began appearing in Vancouver theater production at Bard on the Beach, Pacific Theatre, and the Gateway Theatre. He soon toured with a production of "Waiting for Godot" to Prague - where he remained for almost a decade - where he co-founded the famous English language theater company Misery Loves Co. as well as appeared in several local Czech companies such as divadlo na zabradli, kaspar, and divadlo v dlouhe.

Since his return to Canada in the late nineties, David has appeared in dozens of film and TV projects including Stargate: Atlantis (2004), Arrow (2012), Supernatural (2005), Fringe (2008), Eureka (2006), Continuum (2012), Tomorrowland (2015), HBO's The Sleepers (2019), and, since 2019, Carnival Row (2019). He lives in Vancouver with his family.

After studying at the Institute of Industrial Arts and the Marionette Faculty of the Prague Academy of Fine Arts in the 1950s, Jan Svankmajer started working as a theatre director, chiefly in association with the Theatre of Masks and the Black Theatre. He first experimented with film-making after becoming involved with the multimedium productions of Prague's Lanterna Magika Theatre. He began making short films in 1964, and continued working in the same medium for over twenty years, when he finally achieved his long-held ambition to make a feature film based on Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland (Alice (1988)). He has also exhibited his drawings, collages and 'tactile sculptures', many of which were produced in the mid-1970s, when he was temporarily banned from film-making by the Czech authorities. He has been a card-carrying member of the Prague Surrealist Group since 1969.

Barbora Kodetová was born on 6 September 1970 in Prague, Czechoslovakia [now Czech Republic]. She is an actress and writer, known for Children of Dune (2003), Dune (2000) and Tristan + Isolde (2006). She has been married to Pavel Sporcl since 1 May 2015. They have two children.

Frantisek Lederer was born on November 6th, 1899, in Czechoslovakia. His father was a leather merchant, and young Frantisek began his working life as a department store delivery boy in Prague. He fell in love with acting from a young age, and was soon on stage touring Moravia and then all over Central Europe with people like Peter Lorre.

Lederer was easily lured into film by German actress Henny Porten and her producer husband. And it wasn't long before he was starring in the legendary German silent movie Pandora's Box (1929).

Whilst Lederer, who was using the German name of Franz, shifted from silents to talkies easily and was fast becoming one of Germany's top stars, he hadn't yet learned to speak any English.

By 1934, Lederer, (now using Francis), had begun working in America. And he was getting top billing too. Irving Thalberg had planned to make Lederer "the biggest star in Hollywood" but Thalberg's untimely death put a stop to that. But Lederer continued successfully in film and TV for many years.

After two brief marriages his third lasted 59 years. He invested in property well and made a fortune in the Canoga Park, California area. He founded the National Academy of Performing Arts on which his close friend Joan Crawford was on the Advisory Board. He loved to teach.

Lederer was still teaching the week before he died in 2000, aged 100 years.

Jaroslava Schallerová was born on 25 April 1956 in Prague, Czechoslovakia [now Czech Republic]. She is an actress, known for Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (1970), Láska (1973) and 30 panen a Pythagoras (1977).

After achieving modest fame as an ice skater in her native Czechoslovakia, Vera Hruba was brought to the United States by Republic Pictures head Herbert J. Yates, who hoped to turn her into the next Sonja Henie. After featuring her in two "Ice Capades" movies, he added "Ralston" to her name and tried to pass her off as a leading lady. Hruba's English was so limited, she was forced to learn her lines phonetically. Her English improved, and directors said she tried hard to learn her craft, but bad acting and a thick accent made it difficult for audiences to accept her.

Tereza Srbova was born in Prague, Czech Republic. She holds a Master's degree in culture anthropology. During her studies she worked as a model in Paris and featured in high-end brand campaigns such as Dior. In 2007 she effortlessly transitioned from modeling to acting with her first audition, landing the part of Kirilenko in David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises starring Viggo Mortensen and Vincent Cassel. In the following years she has appeared in films St. Trinian's, Inkheart and Eichmann. In 2010, Srbova played the lead role of Silka in the Lionsgate horror Siren. In this film she performed the song Elephants by Warpaint. In 2013 Srbova portrayed the agent Major Nina Pirogova in the acclaimed Cinemax/HBO series Strike Back, starring Philip Winchester and Sullivan Stapleton. In 2015 she reprized her role in Strike Back: Legacy. In 2018 she portrayed the enigmatic Sonya Galich in Red Joan, a feature film based on a best-selling book and directed by Trevor Nunn. Srbova co-stars opposite Judi Dench, Sophie Cookson and Tom Hughes. In 2022 Srbova plays Jana Breza opposite John Krasinski and Nina Hoss in four episodes of season 3 of Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan. Next to acting she writes and directs short films. In 2021 she wrote a graphic novel which was published in her home country.

Marek Vasut was born on 5 May 1960 in Prague, Czechoslovakia [now Czech Republic]. He is an actor, known for Mission: Impossible (1996), xXx (2002) and Blade II (2002).

Director/writer/producer/actor

Petr Jákl was born on September 14th 1973 in the Czech Republic and got a master degree at the Faculty of Physical Education and Sport at the Charles University in Prague. From his childhood Petr devoted himself to sports and he became the Champion of the Czech Republic in judo 10 times. His sport career culminated during the Olympic games in Sydney in 2000, where he was representing the Czech Republic. Since 1992 he is also active in film industry. He started as an actor and a stuntman in Czech movies and later he was casted into many big Hollywood productions. Shooting with directors Luc Besson (Joan of Arc) and Rob Cohen (xXx) were important turning points in his film career, as they both helped Petr to develop his acting career further. Later on Petr started producing, writing and directing. After his debut thriller Kajínek, which was the highest grossing Czech thriller in the history, he directed a horror movie Ghoul, which was the highest grossing horror in the Czech history. In 2022 his film Medieval with Michael Caine and Ben Foster was distributed worldwide.

Hana Vagnerová was born on 21 February 1983 in Prague, Czechoslovakia [now Czech Republic]. She is an actress and writer, known for Borders of Love (2022), Za vshím hledej zenu (2022) and Villa Lucia (2023).

Dagmar Lassander was born on 16 June 1943 in Prague, Protectorate Bohemia and Moravia [now Czech Republic]. She is an actress, known for Devil Fish (1984), Hatchet for the Honeymoon (1970) and I racconti fantastici di Edgar Allan Poe (1979).

Edita Brychta was born in Prague but grew up in London, having fled with her family from the 1968 Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia. Her parents, Jan and Lida Brychta, are renowned artists who have exhibited all over the world, and her brother Alex Brychta MBE is a worldwide published book illustrator.

Edita began acting as a small child in the Czech film Kinoautomat, the world's first interactive movie, which was presented at the 1967 Expo in Montreal. It wasn't until the age of 16, when she joined London's National Theatre Youth Workshop, that she abandoned her dream of being an ornithologist and decided to pursue an acting career.

She trained at LAMDA and was swiftly signed by leading agent Ken McReddie. In the UK, Edita went on to play Juliet in Romeo & Juliet, Ophelia in Hamlet, Desdemona in Othello and Marguerite in the world premiere of Vaclav Havel's Largo Desolato, directed by Tom Stoppard. She played Sybil Burlington in the award-winning West End production of Daisy Pulls It Off, produced by Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Starring roles in TV series such as Maelstrom, Gentleman and Players, Lovejoy and Taggart followed, as well as the award winning The Escape (Border in the UK) and the BAFTA nominated The Britoil Affair.

Flying In The Branches was created for Edita to play the leading role of a Czech girl trying to make her escape from communist occupied Czechoslovakia.

The highly publicized role of Princess Diana in NBC's Behind The Palace Doors brought Edita to the USA. She continued to work in diverse roles alongside Julia Roberts in Conspiracy Theory, Jim Carrey in Man On The Moon, James Garner in The Rockford Files and Angela Lansbury in Murder She Wrote. She also acted alongside Stellan Skarsgard and Lena Olin in the Swedish film, Friends.

She worked with directors Ronald Neame, Milos Forman, Richard Donner, and in Mark Rydell's Crime Of The Century for HBO with Isabella Rossellini and Stephen Rea.

In the Czech Republic, Edita played in her native language in two films, notably the leading role in Jan Sverak's Akumulator 1. With her language skills, she also starred in a French TV series, Cinq Filles à Paris.

Her knowledge of languages, accents and dialects makes her much in demand for voiceover work in national campaigns, together with animated films such as Ice Age: Continental Drift, Cosmos and The Bunbury Tails, and numerous features including The Bourne Identity, Pirates Of The Caribbean and Man of Steel, as the voice of the mother ship.



Among many video games featuring her voiceover talents are Ming Xiao in Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines. She has featured in radio plays for the BBC, including the critically acclaimed Me, Cheeta: My Life in Hollywood with John Malkovich.

Edita has voiced many audio books including Jane Goodall's Seeds of Hope and was nominated for an Audie for the trilogy, This Man. She performed a live narration for Leonard Bernstein's The Kaddish at Royce Hall in Los Angeles.

For LA Theatre Works, she featured in Daniel Deronda, A Room With a View, Watch on the Rhine and the Tony-award-winning Oslo.

Edita is married to producer David Ladd and has one daughter, Lauren Cassidy, by a previous marriage.

Her passion is open water swimming and she has completed four swims from Alcatraz Island, the length of the Golden Gate Bridge three times and the 10K distance from the Golden Gate Bridge to the Bay Bridge twice, winning numerous medals.

Updated Jan 11, 2020

Jirina Bohdalová was born on 3 May 1931 in Prague, Czechoslovakia [now Czech Republic]. She is an actress and writer, known for Fany (1995), The Immortal Aunt (1993) and Oldies But Goldies (2012).

Born in interwar Prague as Miroslava Stanclová, her father died and she was adopted by a Jewish doctor, the psychoanalyst Dr. Oskar Leo Stern (1900-1972) who married her mother, Miroslava (née Becka; 1898-1945). Dr. and Mrs. Stern had a son, Ivo (1931-2011), the actress's half-brother. The family was, at one point, interned in a concentration camp after they fled their native Czechoslovakia in 1939. They sought refuge in various Scandinavian countries before emigrating to Mexico in 1941.

After winning a beauty contest in Mexico City, young Miroslava spent some time in Los Angeles studying acting. Due to her European features and accent, she rarely found roles other than mysterious women or foreign beauties. She was eventually offered a role in what would become her last and most remembered film: Luis Buñuel's The Criminal Life of Archibaldo de la Cruz (1955).

Soon after the film wrapped, she committed suicide reportedly because the man she loved married another woman. In a macabre coincidence, the premiere of The Criminal Life of Archibaldo de la Cruz (1955), in which a mannequin in her likeness is incinerated, was released during her own cremation in a Mexican graveyard. Her short, tragic life inspired a short story in 1990, and a film, Miroslava (1993).

Petra Cernocká was born on 24 November 1949 in Prague, Czechoslovakia [now Czech Republic]. She is an actress, known for The Girl on a Broomstick (1972), Zpevaci na kraji nemocnice (1982) and I Killed Einstein, Gentlemen (1970). She was previously married to Jan Vaculík.

Eva Vik is an award-winning Czech director, writer, and producer represented by Ridley Scott's Creative Group. Named in Forbes' prestigious 30 Under 30 feature, Vik's films, starring Sean Penn, Suki Waterhouse, Jack Kilmer, Dylan Sprouse, and Barbara Palvin, have premiered on platforms such as Mubi, Nowness, Dazed, Amazon Prime Video, and Vogue, and have screened at the Centre Pompidou in Paris. She has received numerous esteemed film awards, including Best Director awards and nominations at acclaimed festivals like the Tribeca Film Festival.

Vik's latest work includes Serpentine, starring Barbara Palvin, a sci-fi body-horror short film about the birth of a new interspecies. It premiered in the Official Competition at the Tribeca Film Festival and was nominated for the X Award. Serpentine won Best Genre Short Film at the Mammoth Film Festival and was subsequently released by Nowness. Another notable project, Raven, explores the relationship between extraterrestrial intelligence and humanity, tasked with creating new DNA and bringing about the rebirth of planet Earth. Raven was released by Vogue magazine.

Eva Vik has directed various projects in collaboration with Bulgari, including Serpentine, and Bulgari Omnia campaigns featuring actress Cailee Spaeny.

Eva speaks five languages and is an ambassador for White Ribbon USA, a global movement dedicated to ending violence against women and children.

She was born Kai Anne Inge Fischer in Prague (then Czechoslovakia), the daughter of a senior public servant. After the war, Kai's family moved to Munich where she completed her matriculation and took on her first job as a stenographer, progressing from there to photo model and mannequin. Though lacking any genuine dramatic training, Kai made her performing debut on the stage in cabaret at Walter Novak's Schwabinger Brettl (then something of an institution in Munich's nightlife). By the mid-50s, she began acting on the screen.

The hot-blooded redhead found herself quickly typecast as seductresses, ladies of easy virtue, hard-boiled publicans or gangster molls (like her Bettina in Das Wirtshaus im Spessart (1958)). She would occasionally pop up in international productions like the tongue-in-cheek, campy period drama The Hellfire Club (1961) or as Countess Polensky in the Johann Strauss Jr. biopic The Waltz King (1963). By and by, Kai seemed rather more at home as robust characters in popular Edgar Wallace adaptations like Room 13 (1964), The Inn on Dartmoor (1964) or Das Ungeheuer von London-City (1964). From the mid-60s, sometimes billed as 'Kay Fischer', she also made a slew of exploitation films with the emphasis firmly on sex, as well as assorted European potboilers, from spaghetti westerns (Bullets Don't Argue (1964)) to low budget shockers (Island of the Doomed (1967)) and erotic comedy (Die sündige Kleinstadt (1975)).

In the mid-60s, she began to transform her image by devising the character of a female sleuth for her own series, Die Karte mit dem Luchskopf (1963), thereby entering a genre which had previously been the domain of men. In 13 episodes, her Kai Fröhlich solved cases by going undercover, her agency ostensibly run by an imaginary Mr. Luchs (which translates to Lynx and also refers to her detective's visiting card with the emblem of a lynx head).

Kai's image transformation continued through the 70s and 80s with more serious roles in the bleak Wim Wenders drama The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (1972) and as guest star in TV episodes of Der Kommissar (1969), Derrick (1974) and Tatort (1970). Also on television, she found popularity as the circus dompteuse Tiger-Lilli in the miniseries Salto mortale (1969). In 1970, she released an album of 'naughty songs' under the title Kai Fidelity. In 1984, she operated several photography shops in Munich and has also authored crime novels under various pseudonyms.

Madeleine Albright was born on 15 May 1937 in Prague, Czechoslovakia [now Czech Republic]. She was an actress, known for Gilmore Girls (2000), Madam Secretary (2014) and Parks and Recreation (2009). She was married to Joseph Medill Patterson Albright. She died on 23 March 2022 in Washington, District of Columbia, USA.

Jana Kaderabkova was born on 15 January 1982 in Prague, Czechoslovakia [now Czech Republic]. She is an actress, known for Hostel (2005), The Division and Hostel Dissected (2006).

Olga Schoberová was born on 15 March 1943 in Prague, Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia [now Czech Republic]. She is an actress, known for Lucrezia (1968), The Vengeance of She (1968) and Le calde notti di Poppea (1969). She was previously married to John Calley and Brad Harris.

Ivan G'Vera was born on 1 April 1959 in Prague, Czechoslovakia [now Czech Republic]. He is an actor and assistant director, known for Terminator Salvation (2009), Casino Royale (2006) and The Hunt for Red October (1990).

Jim Thorpe is an American athlete and Olympic gold medalist. Thorpe became the first Native American to win a gold medal for the United States. Considered one of the most versatile athletes of modern sports, he won Olympic gold medals in the 1912 pentathlon and decathlon, and played American football (collegiate and professional), baseball, and basketball. He lost his Olympic titles after it was found he had been paid for playing two seasons of semi-professional baseball before competing in the Olympics, thus violating the amateurism rules that were then in place. In 1983, 30 years after his death, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) restored his Olympic medals.

Jim Thorpe grew up in Oklahoma, and attended Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where he was a two-time All-American for the school's football team. After his Olympic success in 1912, which included a record score in the decathlon, he added a victory in the All-Around Championship of the Amateur Athletic Union. In 1913, Thorpe signed with The New York Giants Baseball Team, and he played six seasons in Major League Baseball between 1913 and 1919. Thorpe joined the Canton Bulldogs American football team in 1915, helping them win three professional championships; he later played for six teams in the National Football League (NFL). He played as part of several all-American Indian teams throughout his career, and barnstormed as a professional basketball player with a team composed entirely of American Indians.

From 1920 to 1921, Thorpe was nominally the first president of the American Professional Football Association (APFA), which became the NFL in 1922. He played professional sports until age 41. He struggled to earn a living after that, working several odd jobs. He was married three times and had eight children, before suffering from heart failure and dying in 1953.

Thorpe has received various accolades for his athletic accomplishments. The Associated Press named him the "greatest athlete" from the first 50 years of the 20th century, and the Pro Football Hall of Fame inducted him as part of its inaugural class in 1963. A Pennsylvania town was named in his honor and a monument site there is the site of his remains. Thorpe appeared in several films and was portrayed by Burt Lancaster in the film Jim Thorpe -- All-American (1951).

Klára Issová is a Czech actress with Syrian roots. She has starred in more then 80 films and TV series. Her biggest international role was in the Fox/TNT series "Legends" playing the lead love interest opposite Sean Bean and in the National Geographic drama series "Genius: Einstein" where she portrayed Marie Curie.

She won the Shooting Star Award at the Berlinale Film Festival and has been nominated three times for the Czech Lion Film Award, winning the award once.

Klára worked as a stage actor for 15 years including two productions she managed to produce as well as star in. Some of the most important roles she portrayed on stage were: Stella in A Streetcar Named Desire Alice in Closer Catherine in A View From The Bridge Lady Anne in Richard the Third

Klára graduated from Prague's Conservatory of Dramatic Art. She worked with the acting and English language coach Joe Weintraub for two years and work-shopped with Bernard Hiller, another acting coach, while staying in Los Angeles. She also participated in several physical workshops such as pantomime, improvisation, and dance flow to extend her knowledge of working with the body and follow its impulses. Recently she has been working with voice teacher Ivana Vostárková.

Klára always works to extend her skills to achieve authenticity and a deeper impression from her roles. She brings sincerity, openness, and joy to her work and finds satisfaction in preparing extensively to embody her characters.

She likes to spend time in nature taking long walks, enjoys salsa dance lessons, and personal fitness training. Klára also takes care of her garden where she grows her fruit and vegetables.